Gadigal Station most beautiful metro station wins 2025 title

Gadigal Station most beautiful metro station recognition for 2025 has put Sydney’s newest metro interior in the international spotlight. Prix Versailles, in collaboration with UNESCO, awarded the project the World Title – Special Prize for Interior, as noted by Sydney Metro.

The station also featured in November 2024 on the “Magnificent Seven” list, which brings together the seven most beautiful passenger stations in the world for 2025, as reported by Railway Supply. In combination, the two distinctions present Gadigal Station as an interior intended to read as a public landmark, not only a transit point.

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Prix Versailles World Title – Special Prize for Interior

Natural materials, advanced technical solutions, and cultural integration sit at the center of the design. Spacious halls clad in sandstone lead passengers toward platforms with a futuristic look, while tubular aluminum panels give the space its visual identity and support the acoustics.

The station was conceived as a quality public space integrated into the urban fabric of the city of Sydney. The approach aims to make the daily passenger experience feel deliberate and spacious, while keeping the station’s role as working metro infrastructure clear.

Aboriginal cultural heritage integrated into station design

Aboriginal cultural heritage integrated into station design is expressed through both naming and art. Gadigal Station is named after the Gadigal people, and at its entrances is Return of the Gadi Reed—four cast-aluminum sculptures by Rowena Welsh-Jarrett, Alison Page, and Dakota Dixon.

The installation is inspired by traditional necklaces made from gadi, native reeds that once grew in the Tank Stream valley, where the station is located today. It complements The Underneath installation by Callum Morton, which covers the walls inside the station entrances.

Gadigal Station most beautiful metro station as an urban project

The station also plays a central role in a large-scale urban development project above it. Two towers sit over the site: Parkline Place, a premium office building, and Sydney’s first residential building exclusively for rent, with 234 apartments. The combination of public transport, office space, and housing reflects an increasingly common approach in large cities, where mobility infrastructure is becoming a driver for urban regeneration and smart densification.

Opened in August 2024, Gadigal Station is used by approximately 15,700 passengers per day and is part of a six-station underground section between Central and Sydenham. Express services offer journey times of 13 minutes to Chatswood and nine minutes to Sydenham, reinforcing the station’s role in the metro network.

The Prix Versailles award recognizes the architectural and design excellence of the project carried out by Sydney Metro, in partnership with Foster + Partners and COX Architecture, as reflected in the Foster + Partners project profile. For Sydney Metro, the award confirms its ambition to transform subway stations from simple functional infrastructure into landmark public spaces that can compete globally in terms of architecture and culture.

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